"You are not a writer, Heather B. Armstrong, or a world-travelling, pastry-baking, model mother-to-be.

Give. It. Up."

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The above comment was posted this morning on mihow, a personal blog which I read regularly and enjoy a great deal. The comment has since been removed, but it stuck with me, and not in a good way.

Dooce, which is written by the Heather B. Armstrong the commenter above refers to (for the four of you out there who don't know that), is another blog I read just about every day. Like Michele's posts on mihow, I think Heather's posts on dooce are good reading. I can relate to her struggle with depression, her posts about her dog and her gropey spouse (though I know my spouse is going to argue that I'm gropier than he is - and he's probably right). She writes about her life in an entertaining and engaging way on her blog, and I can appreciate that, and to the fact that she has attained a certain level of celebrity and all the opportunities that go along with that, I say good for her.

I write about my life on this blog. That doesn't mean I want to be Heather, and that doesn't mean that my blog is an attempt to copy her or get some little slice of the celebrity she has achieved. In fact, I read dozens and dozens of other "personal" blogs, some of which are written by people I know "in real life" and some of which are written by people I have never met. I enjoy them all, which is why I read them, but that doesn't mean I want to be any of those people, either. I'm confident the feeling is mutual.

I started blogging long before I knew about Heather B. Armstrong and her website, and I'm sure that many others who write about nothing more involved or meaningful than the ins and outs of their daily lives can say the same thing. The suggestion that anyone who writes a personal blog is trying to emulate someone else makes me bristle - it's ridiculous and insulting.

I truly believe that the internet is an amazing thing. Without it, I wouldn't have my cats, my husband, my life as it is right now. It has changed so much for me. It has enabled me to keep my family and friends who live far away up to date on what is going on my life - the big important things and the little things that happen during the day that are remarkable only in that they are funny or weird, things I would have told them over coffee or at dinner, if we still spent time together every day.

Writing about all of those things on my blog allows me to record them so I don't forget five years from now, when I'm stuck in traffic and losing my temper and cursing the day I ever left a city where I could take public transportation, how much it really sucked sometimes being on a crowded subway car with a dirty old man on one side and a flatulent teenager on the other. I'll remember what it felt like to see my name in print for the first time. I'll remember special meals we've had at home and out, vacations with friends, the happy times and sad times and completely random things that make up a life. My life.

As amazing as the internet is, it annoys me that so many people feel that the anonymity afforded by it makes it okay for them to say mean, spiteful, completely misguided things to others for no conceivable reason. Would you walk up to some random stranger on the street and tell them they suck? Would you knock on someone's door and then shit on their couch when they invite you in? Why do so many people feel that it is acceptable to do that online?